Hakhshara.
Definition and short history

“Hakhshara” refers to the collectively organized vocational training in agriculture, horticulture, manual trades and home economics for young Jewish men and women with the goal of immigrating to the British Mandate of Palestine / Eretz Israel. The term itself comes from the Hebrew and is generally translated as “making fit” or “preparation”.

As Hakhshara has often only been perceived and described from a local perspective, its larger context has usually been ignored. This overarching context was a Zionist project called “Halutziut” (pioneering). Hakhshara trainings were simply the first step. After completing the training, Aliyah (emigration; ascent) to Palestine / Erez Israel would follow, finally culminating in integration and life in a kibbutz community.

Hakhshara trainings were preceded by ideas and practices of an “vocational retraining” which were first discussed and then organized within the Jewish communities starting at the end of the 19^th century. A shift towards “practical” occupations which had long been off limits to Jews were to change the occupational structure within the Jewish population and counter antisemitic prejudices at the same time. It was not until the emergence of Zionism in the 1890s that this “occupational retraining” became linked to the project of the “return” of Jews to Eretz Israel. In addition to practical vocational training, Hakhshara therefore always included the study of Jewish culture and history (tarbut) as a “theoretical” component, along with learning the Hebrew language. Even though many halutzim/halutzot (pioneers) in the first years were practically forced to work alone, in contrast to “occupational retraining”, communal education was also one of the pillars of Hakhshara: practical experience in collective forms of work, education and living, as was necessary for kibbutz life. As life on a kibbutz was to be defined by a Zionist-socialist way of life, these ideas played an important role in Hakhshara training as well as in the Jewish youth groups.

The first groups of the HeHalutz, the umbrella organization of Jewish “halutzim youth” and the organizers of the Hakhshara, were first established mainly in Eastern Europe, where the plight of young Jews and the threat of antisemitism were felt earlier and more strongly than in Germany. The Jewish youth movement acted as a catalyst for the pioneer movement both in Eastern Europe and in Germany. The first Jewish youth groups began to become active shortly before the start of the First World War. Most of the activists in HeHalutz, which emerged after the end of the war, came from these groups. With the possibility of Palestine as a “Jewish homeland”, conveyed above all by the Balfour Declaration (1917), Hakhshara, Aliyah and kibbutz life increasingly began to take shape.

After the end of the First World War, Hakhshara trainings were also offered in Germany for the first time. A national HeHalutz organization was founded in Germany at the end of 1922. During the Weimar Republic, however, it rarely had more than 600 members. From 1928, with “Bachad” (Brit Halutzim Datiim) there was also an umbrella organization of religious Palestine pioneers.

Starting in the mid-late 1920s, non-Zionists within the Jewish community in Germany also began to show increasing interest in these new career prospects, even though their goal was not living on a kibbutz in Palestine. The most prominent project was the “Jewish Settlement Gross Gaglow” near Cottbus. The aim here was not to prepare for emigration or Aliyah, but to create a Jewish settlement within Germany. In 1936, a “Jewish Emigration Training” was founded in Groß-Breesen in Silesia, where young non-Zionists received training comparable to that in the Hakhshara. The term “vocational retraining” was used to describe it in order to differentiate it from the Zionist Hakhshara.

Some of the Hakhshara trainings in agriculture, horticulture and home economics took place on so-called training farms. This was the preferred (often idealized) form of the halutzim organizations from the very beginning. However, training farms were rather the exception before 1933, as the halutz organizations usually simply had to take the places they were offered.

Besides the dominant agricultural Hakhshara, starting in the mid-1920s, there were increasingly offers of training in the trades and home economics These took place mostly in cities. Their experience remains underrepresented in Hakhshara research, mainly due to the insufficient sources available. Hakhshara training in cities should be distinguished from general vocational training that was offered by organizations like Jewish charities and synagogue communities. An important feature of urban Hakhshara were the Bate halutz (pioneer houses), where participants not only lived together, but also met for tarbut and learning Hebrew.

A small number of the halutzim/halutzot completed specialized training beyond what has already been described; for example, the so-called maritime Hakhshara.

When the Nazis took power in 1933, not only did the reality of life for the Jews in Germany change dramatically, but also the specific situation of the Palestine pioneers. As a reaction to their increasing disenfranchisement by the Nazi dictatorship, more and more young Jews joined the Halutz organizations. The German chapter of HeHalutz reached a high of 14,000 members already in 1933/34. As Hakhshara training was required in order to receive one of the strictly limited worker-entry certificates from the British Mandate, Hakhshara was further developed from an institution for Jewish self-help and Zionist education to a comprehensive training, education and emigration system. Hakhshara farms and centers in Germany were now the norm, also due to the fact that there were fewer and fewer training opportunities with non-Jewish farmers.

From 1932/33, the project “Youth Aliyah” was developed alongside Hakhshara, which was aimed at Jewish young people under 18. These young people were to only complete a short preparation course in Germany and then a comprehensive two-year training including Hebrew language and tarbut education in Palestine. The Youth Aliyah groups that arrived in Palestine starting in the spring of 1934 were mostly sent to kibbutzim, but also in so-called children’s and youth villages like Ben Shemen. After it became impossible for most Jewish young people to receive a higher education in Germany starting in 1935, the Zionist organizations created the so-called Middle Hakhshara (Mi-Ha), a third institution located between a classic Hakhshara and Youth Aliyah as far as the training conditions and length were concerned. Here young people under the age of 18 could receive vocational training in Germany, which also included comprehensive schooling.

After 1933, Hakhshara training became more and more important in other European countries, also because the number of Hakhshara places in Germany could no longer meet the demand. Already from the mid-1920s, HeHalutz and Bachad had sporadically offered such training. In the 1930s, already a third of all German halutzim/halutzot completed their training outside of Germany, primarily in the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden. In contrast to Germany, these trainings were mainly individual Hakhshara with non-Jewish farmers. In order to still provide for a collective exchange of ideas and communal learning, HeHalutz and Bachad organized weekly group meetings, which were also used for tarbut and Hebrew lessons. Thus, some of these groups already saw themselves as “kibbutzim”, and the term “Hakhshara kibbutz” was commonly used.

During the night of the November Pogrom on November 9, 1938 and afterwards, numerous Hakhsharot in Germany were raided by Nazis. Halutzim/Halutzot were abused and older youths taken to concentration camps. A large percentage were released shortly thereafter, however under the condition that they leave Germany as quickly as possible. Between November 1938 and the summer of 1939, most Zionist youth groups ceased their work in Germany and relocated many of their activities to other countries. Nevertheless, some officials from HeHalutz and Bachad remained active in Berlin in the vocational preparation department of the Palestine Office in the Meineckestrasse or the Jewish Youth Welfare Association in the Kantstrasse. While some Hakhsharot were able to remain functioning in the years 1939 to 1941, they were increasingly isolated and under ever-expanding Gestapo control.

Between the summer of 1939 and the fall of 1941, Hakhshara sites were gradually being turned into forced labor camps. By October 1941 at the latest, when Jews were banned from leaving Germany, the idea of “preparation” and “making fit” for Aliyah also had to finally be abandoned. Nevertheless, there were still groups and individuals in the former Hakhsharot who continued to uphold their identity as halutzim/halutzot despite the adverse conditions.

The last Hakhshara sites that had been turned into forced labor camps were closed down in the spring of 1943 and the remaining halutzim/halutzot deported to extermination camps. This was the initial end of the history of Hakhshara in Germany. After the Nazi occupation of Poland, Czechoslovakia, France, the Benelux countries and some Scandinavian countries, the young halutzim/halutzot who had training there in Hakhshara outside of Germany were now in imminent danger. Several halutz connections led to the formation of resistance groups which, organized illegal escape routes, for example. After the end of the Second World War there were once again Hakhshara trainings in Germany, primarily around the displaced persons camps. There, mainly Jews from Eastern Europe who had survived the extermination camps were preparing for a life in Palestine (and from 1948 in Israel). At the same time, there was the Gehringshof farm estate, also known as kibbutz Buchenwald, which was partially formed and influenced by Holocaust survivors from the former Hakhsharot Ahrensdorf and Neuendorf. There had been a religious Hakhshara at the Gehringshof already in the 1920s.

There has only been research specifically devoted to the topic since the 1980s. A former halutza, Ilana Michaeli (Gut Winkel), and a former intern, Werner Tom Angress (Groß-Breesen) pioneered Hakhshara research with the publication of their memoirs. At the same time, local history buffs in Germany such as Herbert and Ruth Fiedler (Landwerk Ahrensdorf) or Sieghard Bußenius (Brüderhof) began looking into the history of local Hakhsharot. Meanwhile there are numerous large and small depictions of Hakhshara which provide important insights; however, there is no comprehensive account. A comprehensive exploration of the Hakhshara remains a desideratum of research. More on the literature available »